


Shift and Contract

by orphan_account



Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Gen, Post Reichenbach, References to Suicide
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-05
Updated: 2013-02-05
Packaged: 2017-11-28 08:01:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 393
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/672109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This evening is different.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shift and Contract

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings for suicide and a small but concentrated dose of angst.

He’d never wanted to be a statistic, but we all have our cross to bear; fortunately for him he won’t be carrying it for very long, indeed at all.

He’s within the 2 year time-frame in which most veterans commit the act, so this’ll probably be attributed to his PTSD. He thinks that it may well be a PTSD of some kind, although this trauma comes from the battlefield that Sherlock dragged behind him like the velvet cloak of an ancient king.

 

 Again, the tremors stem from the deep-seated longing to be useful again. Again, the Sig in the drawer becomes a palpable presence in the room. Again, he can barely look in its direction without becoming locked in a staring match with a desk drawer. Again, he’s left alone, again without choice; again he’s turned into a bitter shadow of the John Watson everybody knew.

 

This evening is different. This evening, he’s come home from another already-fading day doing not-very-much to find once again his best friend’s face plastered all over BBC News 24 as they finally catch up to the not-news that Sherlock wasn’t a fraud. It makes him a little bit nauseous how often they show St Bart’s. When the correspondent appears, gabbling platitudes just next to the patch of pavement which will ever remain stained with blood in John’s memory, he freezes there on the sofa, and after too many interminable seconds he blinks and comes back to himself - mind consumed by the thought that danced behind his eyes for far too long in the time Before and now returns to exact a terrible vengeance in the torturous After. When his muscles unclench and his vision clears he gets up and walks over to the desk and takes out the gun and holds its dearly familiar weight in his hand, and it only makes him cry more to remember Sherlock holding it in his hand and shooting the boring walls or threatening Moriarty or even twitching about to prove what a little twerp Dimmock was.

 

He puts it in his mouth

and the cool metal stings against his pallet

and he sits for a little while

and the tears cool on his cheeks making his face clammy

whilst he breathes

in out

in out

in out

he comes to a decision

his skeletal muscles shift

and contract

and _squeeze_

**Author's Note:**

> I even hate myself a little for writing this but what can you do? Comments are always very much appreciated.


End file.
